routed

Here was a chaos of men, the slowest trampled or abandoned, the fastest straining to stay in front, all clambering over one another in a desperate effort to outrun the steadily advancing enemy. The enemy, who was even now approaching in formation, was a wall of musket and cannon and sword, a perfect line of gleaming bayonets. Bullets and exploding cannonballs found the backs of the fleeing soldiers, who, unable to reach shelter, sprinted across an impossibly flat battleground.

Doomed, some began to give up. They sat, lay down, or charged back toward the enemy, howling as they ran, shooting wildly and without taking aim. But the enemy was faceless. It fired rhythmically, loosing a volley every ten seconds. No one in the back survived these volleys, whether running, sitting, or charging. The men in the rear could count down their deaths by the time elapsed from the last shot.

Then someone stood. Not sat, not lay down, not madly reversed, but stood. He was a tall, strong man with black hair and steely eyes. He held his gun like a toy in his massive hand as he turned to regard the enemy and his fleeing comrades. He stood a full head above the other men there, and his placid expression caught them by surprise. Here was a giant! But even so, how could he be this calm in the face of certain death?

Peering over the heads of his fellow soldiers, he spoke in a booming voice. "We outnumber them."